ABSTRACT
The inverse magnetocaloric effect occurs when a magnetic material cools down under applied magnetic field in an adiabatic process. Although the existence of the inverse magnetocaloric effect was recently reported experimentally, a theoretical microscopic description is almost nonexistent. In this paper we theoretically describe the inverse magnetocaloric effect in antiferro- and ferrimagnetic systems. The inverse magnetocaloric effects were systematically investigated as a function of the model parameters. The influence of the Néel and the compensation temperature on the magnetocaloric effect is also analyzed using a microscopic model.
ABSTRACT
In this work the magnetocaloric effect is theoretically investigated considering a microscopic model Hamiltonian, which describes a magnetic system formed by two sublattices of different magnetic ions coupled by exchange and magnetoelastic interactions. We analyze systematically several profiles of the ferrimagnetic arrangements that were studied earlier without the magnetoelastic interaction. The influence of changing the magnetoelastic parameters on the magnetization, isothermal entropy change and adiabatic temperature change curves are investigated. Depending on the model parameters, the magnetic system shows a first-order magnetic phase transition leading to high direct and inverse magnetocaloric effect, besides two simultaneous first-order magnetic phase transitions which were predicted. A constant ΔS(T) = 0.4 J mol(-1) K(-1) is obtained in the simulated system in a temperature interval of 50 K, around 110 K.